Image of Renate Reinsve in the film ‘Backrooms’, by Kane Parsons. EFE/EDITORIAL USE ONLY/PROVIDED BY A24 AND ELASTICA FILMS
Madrid, June 3 (EFE) – ‘Backrooms’ is a low-budget, retro-styled horror film about labyrinthine spaces that exist beyond reality. Directed by 20-year-old YouTuber and filmmaker Kane Parsons, it has become a box office hit in much of the world and threatens to conquer it as it reaches other countries.
The film is number one in 42 countries, from the United States and Canada – where it grossed $81.4 million – to the United Kingdom, Australia, Italy, Taiwan, Sweden, Mexico – with $6.6 million – Argentina, Chile, Ecuador, Peru, Venezuela, Paraguay, and other regions, where it premiered last week. It
is now arriving in Spain, Russia, and Malta, and will be released in Panama, Guyana, Belgium, Switzerland, Germany, and Singapore later this month.
With the independent and fresh spirit of ‘The Blair Witch Project’ (1999) and a terrifying theme, it has become one of the most talked-about films of the year in the specialized press, searching for the keys to bringing audiences back to theaters.
The story, starring the award-winning and ubiquitous Renate Reinswe (‘Sentimental Value’) and Chiwetel Ejiofor (’12 Years a Slave’), begins when a strange door appears in the basement of a furniture store. When a therapist’s patient disappears into a dimension beyond reality, she must venture into the unknown to try to rescue him.
The film is an evolution of a YouTube series that began as ‘creepypasta’ (short, viral horror stories), created by this very young British-American filmmaker. It had a production budget of ten million dollars, a high figure for an independent film in the United States, but far from the more than 100 million that major Hollywood studio films typically cost.
That 10 million has already multiplied tenfold at the box office. Produced by A24—specializing in arthouse and cult films like ‘Hereditary’—it has become number one after grossing 118 million dollars in theaters where it has been released, 81.4 million of which came from the United States and Canada, according to Box Office Mojo.
Furthermore, the film has mobilized one of the youngest and most diverse audiences in recent times and has triumphed among younger viewers, receiving a strong reception from those under 21.
It’s a psychological horror thriller that transforms a viral urban legend—labyrinthine spaces that exist beyond reality, or ‘liminal spaces’—into a cinematic nightmare. The first episode of the series that inspired the film, which premiered on YouTube in 2022, has over 80 million views.
The film recreates an analog VHS horror inspired by the bleak nostalgia of the 80s and 90s, complete with static electricity, yellowish fluorescent lighting, faded wallpaper, and an utter emptiness in architectural spaces.
According to a statement from Elástica, which distributes the film in Spain, in just three days since its release on May 29, it has already become the fifth highest-grossing title in A24’s history and has broken records as A24’s biggest opening in more than 30 countries. EFE
